Defence sector can learn from Formula 1, says UK SME
The UK defence sector should harness the rapid innovation capabilities found in the country’s Formula 1 motorsport industry to deliver on programmes with tight timeframes, according to a newcomer to the military marketplace.
UK-based MGI Engineering, which has a history of collaboration with Formula 1 racing teams and pivoted into uncrewed platforms and one-way attack drones, said the concept of ‘spiral development’, a buzzword in military circles where a platform quickly and frequently upgraded, is already well understood in elite motorsport.
“One of the things that the defence sector needs is agility and rapid development,” stated Mike Gascoyne, CEO of MGI, during a media event on 11 July, adding in Formula 1, “every two weeks you are fighting somewhere around the world”.
This motorsport process mirrors the rapid development cycle of uncrewed platforms in Ukraine, Gascoyne stated, where both sides are embroiled in an ongoing arms race to iterate at the pace of relevance on the battlefield.
“Ukraine has told us that it’s always about rapid development,” Gascoyne said. “Industry has lost this trait.”
This sentiment was echoed by another senior official at MGI, who said that learning from engineering techniques practiced by Formula 1 “is the way the [UK] Ministry of Defence should go”.
A further role that the UK’s Formula 1 industry could aid defence programmes would be in providing the ability to scale-up concepts developed by SMEs, which may not have the necessary in-house manufacturing capacity to deliver in volume.
SkyShark pitched for growing OWE drone market
Army Technology was among a small cadre of press invited by MGI to attend a test day at a small aerodrome in Oxfordshire, where the company was running taxi and ground trials with its SkyShark one-way effector (OWE), effectively a tactical-sized loitering munition, also referred to as a suicide drone.
SkyShark is being developed in two variants: a gas turbine-powered model developed with Argive, and a fully electric low-signature version designed with Greenjets.
Although using some components from overseas, the OEW is UK-designed and built, and is being pitched as a possible solution for the UK military’s burgeoning drone requirements.
A shift in the structure of the British Army will see it configured in a ‘20:40:40’ format, which will see 20% of the force comprised of traditional crewed armour and artillery, 40% being made up of larger tactical and strategic drones, with the final 40% formed through ranks of attritable OWE and uncrewed surveillance systems.
It is into the latter 40% that SkyShark is being pitched. MGI says it will be commercially available from August this year.
However, despite the UK-centric nature of MGI and its SkyShark programme, Gascoyne said it is difficult to conduct flight uncrewed flight testing in the country, describing it as a “huge problem”.
Following the ground test day, MGI is set to head to Spain to perform further flight tests of SkyShark.
The business case for platforms like SkyShark and other OWEs is clear: cost-effective strike operations at emergent targets of interest. While highly complex and sophisticated stand-off munitions like the UK-French Storm Shadow cruise missile offer pinpoint accuracy and lethality, they are also expensive.
Capable but less complex OWEs, with a price point in the tens- or hundreds-of-thousands of pounds, compared to the millions for Storm Shadow, can provide a quantitative boost for swarm operations.
This concept of operations is widely seen in the Ukraine war, particularly from Russia, where dozens, if not hundreds of OWEs are used in swarm attacks, some acting as decoys, others containing jamming and electronic attack systems, to enable to warhead-equipped platforms to strike their target.
MGI intends to exhibit the SkyShark OWE at the upcoming DSEI defence exhibition in September, where it will be joined by the in-development TigerShark, a more advanced version with increased range and autonomy.
SkyShark will be able to deliver a 20kg payload – the warhead – to a range of over 250km with subsonic velocity exceeding 450km/h.
According to business intelligence company GlobalData, the sector is expected to nearly double in value from 2025-2035, reaching $25.1bn by the end of the forecast period.
Of that, the loitering munition segment represents around 8% of the current UAV market, sustaining the highest compound annual growth rate over the next decade compared to other UAV platform variants.
